A Valley Without Wind #13 - Beta Gameplay Footage Part One (Video)

[x4000]

Yep, never any required sounds; we don't want to exclude the deaf, either. You can also turn offend music but leave the sounds and/or ambient noises, too.

[superking]

You might benefit from looking at how Diabolo II handles healthbars; iirc, the healthbar of the last monster you hit appears on the GUI. it looks really well and keeps the visuals blissfully free of immersion breaking healthbars

[Nalgas]

Remember, that video is at 1080i

You keep using that word...  It sure didn't look interlaced to me, just poorly compressed by YouTube, etc.  Heh.

I'm not sure what the robotron style keys means

Well, movement and aiming like Robotron, or any of the many, many more recent games that have been influenced by it that let you move in one direction while shooting in another, the most common examples of which are the revival of dual-stick shooters over the past several years.  Yes, it can be done fairly well with just a keyboard, too, no mouse or gamepad, for those of you out there who are skeptical.

[x4000]

In our case for the health bars, we only show them for anything that gets damaged for about 5 seconds after it is damaged.  Since so very many things have area damage of some variety in this game, that keeps the health bars to a minimum insofar as they can be reduced.  Reducing them further would really be removing pretty important info, I think.

And -- dang, I mean 1080p.

Thanks for the link on Robotron, I never played that but I used to play what I think was an Atari 2600 spinoff of it.  Robo...something.  But the graphics and such didn't look quite like that, and you couldn't shoot in a different direction from what you were moving thanks to the atari controller.

In terms of moving and shooting in different directions with the keyboard and gamepad, that is supported but it's one of those things that I don't think feels really great yet.  We have it actually disabled by default on the keyboard because it was too easy to accidentally knock it and do something unintended.  Keith doesn't like that sort of firing mode, and I really have been converted over to mouse + keyboard for this game, so we don't have anyone yet who is actively seeking to use this mode, which makes it hard to refine.  I've played a number of dual stick shooters on consoles and iPhone, but the thing those have in common is a need to use just the shoulder buttons for firing since you need both your thumbs for movement and aiming.  A control mechanism like that for the gamepad could work, but... well, it seems mildly wasteful of the face buttons.  Those could be used for map, inventory, etc, I guess, though.  Anyway, I think that those forms of controls are going to need a lot of feedback during actual playtesting, and we might have to come up with one or more default templates that people can then customize.

[Nalgas]

Keith doesn't like that sort of firing mode, and I really have been converted over to mouse + keyboard for this game, so we don't have anyone yet who is actively seeking to use this mode, which makes it hard to refine.

I don't know that I'd be actively seeking it myself, either, but I've played stuff before where it worked (Anyone remember Battle-Girl?  Anyone?  Bueller?), so it is at least theoretically possible, in the same way you could play old FPSes using the keyboard for both movement and aiming.

A control mechanism like that for the gamepad could work, but... well, it seems mildly wasteful of the face buttons.  Those could be used for map, inventory, etc, I guess, though.

Yeah, the face buttons are still perfectly usable for things you don't need constant access to at the same time as you're doing all those other things (generally out of combat/danger), so even though it's sub-optimal in some ways, they're still good for something.  When people are really serious, they'll start using crazy claw grips to hold the controller so they can use the stick, the face buttons, and the shoulder buttons/triggers all at the same time (I've made myself quite sore doing that in a couple games), but normal people have enough sense not to.  Heh.

[x4000]

Heh, yeah.  And that's a good point, too -- the face buttons could still be used even for things like healing spells, come to think of it.  Trap laying, etc.  Even area-of-effect spells if it's not something that has to be targeted at all.  The only thing you can't do while aiming is use any face buttons, and vice-versa, but there's plenty of stuff that requires no aim like the above.  Interesting!

In terms of playing FPS games with just the keyboard... yeah, I used to do that, and I had a really hard time of it.  I played Wolfenstein 3D, Duke Nukem 3D, Quake 1, Quake 2, and Descent all that way.  Then later I figured out what all the fuss about WASD was, and never looked back.  I went from struggling on the second from the bottom difficulty in Quake 2 to being able to reliably beat the top difficulty.

Hence... why I'm not to excited about keyboard-only direct-aiming, and why we focus on the targeting mode for that more.  But, if there's somebody who really wants that mode, then they will be a good source for refining it when the time comes!

[Nalgas]

In terms of playing FPS games with just the keyboard... yeah, I used to do that, and I had a really hard time of it.  I played Wolfenstein 3D, Duke Nukem 3D, Quake 1, Quake 2, and Descent all that way.  Then later I figured out what all the fuss about WASD was, and never looked back.  I went from struggling on the second from the bottom difficulty in Quake 2 to being able to reliably beat the top difficulty.

When I said old, I really meant old.  Stuff like Wolf3D, Doom, and the first Marathon, which all worked reasonably well that way, at least partly because mouselook was still a novel concept in general.  Playing Quake and especially Descent without a mouse kind of scares me, though.  Descent is hard enough with a mouse instead of a joystick.  Heh.

[x4000]

Yeah, actually, I don't think I've ever played Descent with anything but keyboard only.  And Descent II, which I liked even better, actually.  Descent: Freespace and then that other Descent-like game by another company I played with the mouse controls.  Forget the name of the second thing there.

I remember when mouse look was newfangled and I scoffed at it.  I think what convinced me finally was when I found opponents circle-strafing me in online matches.  Then the lightbulb came on, and everything got easier in solo play, too.

[zebramatt]

Heh, yeah.  And that's a good point, too -- the face buttons could still be used even for things like healing spells, come to think of it.  Trap laying, etc.  Even area-of-effect spells if it's not something that has to be targeted at all.  The only thing you can't do while aiming is use any face buttons, and vice-versa, but there's plenty of stuff that requires no aim like the above.  Interesting!

In terms of playing FPS games with just the keyboard... yeah, I used to do that, and I had a really hard time of it.  I played Wolfenstein 3D, Duke Nukem 3D, Quake 1, Quake 2, and Descent all that way.  Then later I figured out what all the fuss about WASD was, and never looked back.  I went from struggling on the second from the bottom difficulty in Quake 2 to being able to reliably beat the top difficulty.

Hence... why I'm not to excited about keyboard-only direct-aiming, and why we focus on the targeting mode for that more.  But, if there's somebody who really wants that mode, then they will be a good source for refining it when the time comes!

In fact, I've played some really good third person games where the second stick aims and shoots, freeing up the triggers and shoulder buttons for other things. Normally that requires some sort of rapid fire element and/or lenient ammunition policy to work but I thought it worth mentioning at least!

[x4000]

In fact, I've played some really good third person games where the second stick aims and shoots, freeing up the triggers and shoulder buttons for other things. Normally that requires some sort of rapid fire element and/or lenient ammunition policy to work but I thought it worth mentioning at least!

Yeah, pretty much all of the iPhone dual stick shooters use that mechanic simply by virtue of there not being any shoulder buttons at all.  The problem there is that it really is ammo-draining, and it assumes you can only have one primary type of ammo at a time.  Typically you tap somewhere else to toggle through your limited number of gun types.  It works for iPhone games, but I don't really enjoy it much to be honest.  The goal with AVWW is that you'll be using spells in combination and switching between them more, so just having one single spell on autofire really would be counter to what I hope to do with the combat here.

But it was definitely worth mentioning, so thanks!

[Cyborg]

Hence... why I'm not to excited about keyboard-only direct-aiming, and why we focus on the targeting mode for that more.  But, if there's somebody who really wants that mode, then they will be a good source for refining it when the time comes!

I would agree with you for FPS. However, Robotron style works great inside of two dimensions. I will test this for you. The reason the mouse is not as enviable, from my perspective, is having to chase down things like bats with your mouse and control a character at the same time. It's actually easier, mentally and otherwise, to time the launch of a projectile while moving in 2 dimensions than it is to point and click. The reason is that the mouse requires a lot more chasing, whereas a single button push could have done the job if you are familiar with the timing. Using your video as an example, shooting behind you while running forwards is a single button push, whereas with the mouse you actually have to be pointing at the right area.

I won't use the 'e' word, but it applies here!

I agree with you that in FPS, twitch related skills are necessary that can only be done by whipping the mouse, but that's not true in 2 dimensions.

[x4000]

I'm not disputing that some might find that to be their control mechanism of choice in this game.  I think that plenty of precision can be gotten out of any specific control mechanism depending on how accustomed to it one is.  I'm accustomed to the mouse, so nothing else comes close for me personally and I don't care to try to retrain my brain.  Anyhow, I appreciate the offer of help when the time comes for that -- I'm sure others will much appreciate it, too!

[Nenad]

Don't have time to read the whole topic right now (and I want to read everything ), so just a small comment for now:

Is there anywhere on the internet I can re-listen to the music from the game (except from this Beta video)?

[x4000]

Not yet!  But it will be in ogg format right in the game folder (same as with AI War and Tidalis) as soon as we hit beta. )